


Preludes

by WorryinglyInnocent



Series: Brief Encounters [1]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Charity Chase remix, F/M, Golden Lace, Rumbelle - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-28
Updated: 2014-10-28
Packaged: 2018-02-23 00:49:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2527832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WorryinglyInnocent/pseuds/WorryinglyInnocent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cross-posting from tumblr in anticipation of Ripperblackstaff's forthcoming birthday present. A Chase'verse remix. In a seedy hotel bar in Rome, archaeologist Dr Gold crosses paths with the mysterious Lacey French, and decides to take a chance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Preludes

**Author's Note:**

> I was sent [this picture prompt](http://ripperblackstaff.tumblr.com/post/88986222033/worryinglyinnocent-aka) by [ripperblackstaff](http://ripperblackstaff.tumblr.com) on tumblr, and thus this fic was born. It's a remix of the Charity Chase series - sent in the same universe but not compatible with the current fics in the series. 
> 
> Rated: NC-17

If there was one thing that Gold was certain of, it was that at forty years of age, he was too old for a holiday romance. He therefore rationalised his feelings by saying that  it was not a holiday, it was an archaeological dig, ergo research, ergo work, and it was not a romance, it was simply lust that he had not (as of yet) acted upon.

Gold had seen her every day that summer. She was always there when he came back to the hotel after the day’s work. Always sitting in the same place at the bar, always with the same drinks in front of her, always with her back to him.

At first he had ignored her. He had ignored the hooded eyes that watched his every move in the mirror behind the bar as he came past her to go up to his room and change out of his dig clothes and into the suit he wore like armour, before returning to the bar to eat with Tink.

(Gold didn’t like digs - he much preferred to work in the quiet and easy concentration of his office or the university labs, away from distractions and human interaction - and he absolutely hated the fact that the dust constantly blowing about meant he had to wear his detested glasses instead of his contact lenses. He liked to get out of the trappings of archaeology as soon as he could, preferring to spend as little time as possible looking like he had spent the day in a hole in the ground. At least this time his colleagues were bearable, his only real interaction being with Tink, a no-nonsense post-doc student on loan to the project from the University of Canberra; she gave as good as she got and wasn’t above ‘accidentally’ hitting him with her trowel.)

If it wasn’t midsummer and a full moon, and if it wasn’t his first research trip since his divorce, he probably wouldn’t have done anything. She was probably half his age for a start. 

But it was midsummer, and it was a full moon, and his decree absolute had come through the day before he’d left for Rome and he’d spent the last two weeks feeling bitter and angry and in need of female company, if only for a couple of hours.

If he were at home, he’d pour himself a large Scotch and put some mindless skin flick on; perhaps call a sex line if he wanted a little more intimacy.

But he wasn’t at home. He was in a mediocre hotel with a cheap bar and a woman he didn’t know constantly tracking his every move in the mirror.

It was the last night before they flew home. Last chance. After tonight he would likely never see her again. If he was a stronger man he would leave well alone, after all, he’d lasted this long.  But he was weak-willed, and her eyes had met his in the mirror the moment he had walked in the door, and she had held his gaze steadily.

"Gold? Gold?"

Tink waved a hand in front of his face but it didn’t register until he heard her give a good-natured sigh and take his equipment bag from his hand. “When you can’t find your kit in the morning, it’s in my room. Now for the love of the almighty, go and talk to her.”

On any other day, he would have shaken himself out of his daze and gone up the stairs. He would have showered and made an effort to shave and he would have put his damn lenses in to make himself look halfway presentable. But something in the way she looked at him in the mirror made her eyes almost like a challenge. If he left now, the spell would be broken, the chance would be lost.

_Let me see the scientist behind the gentleman’s façade_ , she seemed to be saying.

Gold had an irrational fear that if he left the bar now, she would not be there when he returned.

So against his better judgement, he made his way over to the bar and pulled up the stool beside her. It took him a few moments to actually speak, mainly because he had no idea if she was local or not and he was at a loss for which language to use.

“ _Buenasera_ ,” he finally settled on, because most people travelling in Italy knew that at least.

She turned to face him, at last tearing her gaze from his reflection, and she raised an eyebrow. 

"Where’s your suit today, Mr Scientist?"

No hello, no good evening. Just straight in. Gold found he didn’t mind the lack of pleasantries. It suited her. Her accent was Australian, like Tink’s, and Gold wondered how she’d ended up in this little hotel bar on the outskirts of Rome. 

"In my room," he replied levelly.

She smirked. “Is this the part where you invite me to come and see it?”

Gold returned the expression. “I can do if you want. You asked. I merely responded with the truth. And I’m not really a scientist.”

"You’re an archaeologist. Anyone with an ology is a scientist."

Technically he was a preservation specialist and archivist, not an archaeologist, but Gold didn’t correct her. He didn’t think she’d appreciate it. 

The barman had come over to them. 

"Can I get you a drink?" Gold asked. 

The woman looked down at her collection of empties and the large glass of white wine next to her. 

"No, I think I’m set."

Gold ordered a whiskey and turned back to his mysterious companion. 

“So…” She took a sip of her wine and looked him up and down, her eyes travelling slowly from head to toe and back again, lingering for a little too long at his midsection and belt. Gold felt the strange urge to cross his legs, as if she had x-ray vision. “You got a name, Mr Scientist?”

“Gold. And you?”

“Professor Gold,” she mused, not answering his question.

“Doctor. I’m not a professor yet.”

“Nah, I think Professor suits you better.” She finally met his eyes again as she took another sip of wine, before slowly running the tip of her very pink tongue over her lips. Gold immediately felt the blood beginning to rush south, and Jesus, he was forty and he shouldn’t be so turned on from a woman half his age licking her lips, for fuck’s sake. He glanced in the mirror behind the bar, the one that she had watched him in religiously for the past two weeks, wondering what she saw in him. Shaggy hair with the odd strand of premature grey showing through, several days’ worth of beard growth thanks to getting himself sunburned on the first day of the dig and being unable to shave for fear of irritating the skin again, cheap spectacles sliding down his peeling nose. Unwilling to spend any more time looking at his own reflection, he turned to that of his companion, which was infinitely more appealing.

She grinned at him in the mirror, their reflections communicating where their real conversation had stalled.

“Lacey,” she said presently. Gold blinked.

“Pardon?”

“You asked me my name. It’s Lacey.”

Lacey. Racey Lacey. He gave an inward snort at his own bad joke.

“So, what brings you to Rome, Lacey?”

She shrugged.

“This and that.”

Her blue eyes smouldered beneath her lashes. _What brings me to Rome is my business_ , she seemed to be saying. _What keeps me in Rome is sitting beside me._

He was on the verge of inviting her to dinner, or just inviting her up to his room to see his suit, because he was already half-hard and he doubted he’d be able to make it through dinner without completely disgracing himself, but before he could do anything, Lacey had slid off her barstool.

“I’ll be back,” she promised, sauntering off in the direction of the bathrooms.

Gold immediately felt the taste of fear coating the back of his tongue, because it was not the first time he had had a date go to the bathroom and never return. Admittedly, the last time it had happened was over twenty years ago, but the fear was not something that went away.

He waited a few minutes, quietly savouring his whiskey, and he was just about to give it up as a bad job ( _you’re too old for her, you know it, and she knew it as soon as she saw you up close_ ), when something caught his eye.

Lacey’s handbag was still on the counter.

Could she possibly have left it there on purpose, with a view to getting him to come after her? Cautiously, Gold picked up the handbag and made his way in the direction that Lacey had vanished in.

“Lacey?” he ventured.

“Prof!”

He heard her voice hiss in his ear then felt her handbag snatched out of his grasp before her other hand grabbed his and pulled him along in the direction of the kitchen. The staff didn’t seem to notice as they careened through the steamy room, almost knocking over a stack of plates on the way past, and then they were out in the cool evening air, into the alley where the bins were stored. They were greeted by the undeniable odour of decomposing seafood and stale pasta, but Lacey didn’t seem to mind, letting go her grip on Gold’s hand to take a fistful of his shirt and pull him against her with a strength that belied her diminutive size. There was an audible thump as her back hit the brick wall, and suddenly Gold found himself pressing his mouth against hers, Lacey’s tongue pushing insistently at his lips seeking entry. He acquiesced readily; it was too long since he’d done this and he was too eager, but he didn’t care. Lacey was wild, dangerous, impulsive, and it was impossible for him to step away now that he had been swept up in the whirlwind she left in her wake.

This experience was entirely new for him. His and Milah’s sex life had been sedate to the point of boring, and before her there had been precious few encounters, and certainly none in alleyways behind hotel restaurants where any of the staff could come out and bear witness at any point. Somehow, it didn’t matter.

There was urgency in Lacey’s movements as she grabbed his hands from where they had been sitting safely on her waist and brought them round to her bottom, trying to spur him into movement with a not quite so accidental brush of his crotch on her way past.

Well, if she wanted to speed things up, Gold wasn’t going to deny her. He could already tell that this wasn’t going to last long, so he might as well try not to disgrace himself. He slipped a hand up under the hem of Lacey’s skirt, up the back of her thigh to squeeze her bottom, surprised when he didn’t encounter any barrier of lace or elastic. He roamed higher for a waistband but found nothing. Lacey smirked at him.

“Looking for this?”

She dangled the black g-string, so small it could barely have covered her even if she had been wearing it, in front of his face before shoving it in his back pocket and smacking his arse hard, causing him to shunt his hips into hers. “Easy tiger,” she purred. “Oh yes, I’m full of surprises.”

Gold raised an eyebrow. “Got any more?”

“That’s for me to know and you to find out, Prof.”

She hiked up the hem of her skirt, raising one foot to rest on the pile of empty boxes beside her, spreading her open for him, and her eyes gave him that sultry, hungry look again, the same one that she had been wearing in the mirror every day, the same one that had followed him around for a fortnight. The same look was now challenging him to find her hidden surprises.

Gold obliged eagerly; he was already going to hell in a fast car and he was damned if he was going to fail her totally. It had been nearly six months since he’d had any sexual company other than his own hand and he was determined that he couldn’t be that out of practice. Something inside him, a little niggling voice that sounded remarkably like Tink’s, told him that since he would never see her again after tonight, it hardly mattered, but for Gold, that made it even more imperative to make sure Lacey enjoyed herself as much has he did. For all they had only known each other a maximum of twenty minutes, the foreplay to this interlude had been gradually building for two weeks. If this was to be their only encounter, then it was going to be good.

“Oh no.” Lacey hauled him up as he made to kneel before her, worship her like the modern Venus she was. “You’re not going down there with that beard, Prof.”

A memory came to him unbidden; Milah had hated him going down on her if he wasn’t freshly clean-shaven, and the appearance of his ex-wife in his head at this crucial moment riled him. He crushed his mouth against Lacey’s again, bringing him back into the moment, and he pushed her skirt up to her waist to snake his hand between her thighs.

The first surprise was that she was completely smooth, no dark curls as a last pretence to modesty, and he saw Lacey quirk an eyebrow at him.

The second surprise, as he quested his fingers lower and gently parted her folds, was quite how wet she was already. Lacey gave a little huff of laughter as his fingers stilled at her entrance.

“Fuck, you’re wet.” It was hardly the pick-up line of the masters, and as soon as he’d said it, Gold immediately regretted it. _Well, state the obvious, why don’t you?_

Lacey cupped his crotch through his jeans and squeezed, and Gold threw his head back.

“And you’re hard,” she quipped, but there was a breathlessness in her voice now, a desperate need that Gold knew was just as evident in his own words. She shifted her hips, wriggling against his hand to get him to move.

The third surprise, Gold found as he moved his hand, anxiously seeking her clit, determined not to let her down, was the cold touch of metal against his fingers. _Holy fuck_.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, the sensible voice that still sounded like Tink told him that he needed to be careful in case he ended up moving the wrong way and hurting her, but the voice was drowned out by a more primal thought, one that was reminding him that he had never found intimate piercings quite as arousing as he suddenly seemed to. Indeed, his jeans were now becoming painful as opposed to simply annoying. He bucked up against Lacey’s hip, the pressure alleviating somewhat, and forced himself to focus on her, as he knew that the moment his cock was out of his trousers and buried in her, he could wave goodbye to any and all finesse he possessed. Gold stroked a finger along her cleft, pressing the piercing up against her clit, and Lacey shuddered, her nails digging in where they held onto him.

“Yes,” she hissed. “Yes, yes, like that, yes.”

He continued to touch her, thumb working her clit against the piercing as he slipped a finger inside to stroke her inner walls, and he felt the moment she came a split second before the breathy scream in his ear. Her thighs quivered as she clenched around his finger, the slick heat flowing out of her to coat his hand like honey. Gold bit down on his tongue to stop him coming with her.

Lacey’s grip lessened as her balance returned, poised gracefully on one leg as she was, and her eyes, when they finally met his, had returned to their dark, challenging look. He had seen her in the moment of abandon, at her most open and vulnerable, but now the enigma was back, her mask of danger and sultry defiance slipping slowly back into place.

She had his belt and fly undone within seconds and before he knew it, she had his cock out and was stroking him up and down.

“Your turn, Prof,” she panted, and Gold knew that it was about more than just tit for tat repayment of pleasure. He had broken down her defences, and she was going to do the same to him. Get beneath the prickly scientist, the immovable man in the suit, just as he had got beneath the seductress.

Frantically Gold felt for his wallet; it was months since he’d had to use a condom and he prayed he still had one and that it was still in date. Although Lacey was doing a more than satisfactory job with her hand, he was going to go mad if he couldn’t be inside her.

Luck obviously liked him at that moment in time, and Lacey grinned.

“Scientists really do think of everything.”

In less than a minute she had rolled the condom on him and was guiding his cock to her dripping core. Gold needed no further encouragement and thrust home with a groan, pounding her hard against the wall with every stroke, Lacey rolling her hips up to meet him.

She felt so hot and tight and wet around him, and it had been so long since he’d been with a woman… Gold didn’t last long before he felt the heat coil in the pit of his stomach and unwind suddenly, spilling himself into the condom and panting against Lacey’s shoulder. He hadn’t expected to.

There was silence for a long time as they stayed melded at the hips, cooling in the darkness that had fallen from the evening twilight. The moment was over.

Gold slipped out of her and moved away so that he was no longer pinning her to the wall, pulling off the condom and tossing it in the nearest bin. Lacey unhooked her foot from the boxes and tugged her skirt down.

She gave him a smirk.

“Seems like you’re full of surprises too, Professor,” she said.

There was a moment of quiet, a moment of vulnerability. For a moment, Gold saw her for what she was: a lost young woman wandering here and there, doing this and that, trying to find her place in the world. He knew she deserved more than a quick fuck in an alley behind the bins; he wanted to take her back to his hotel room, take her in the shower, lay her down on his bed to wait whilst he shaved and then he’d really show her a surprise. He wanted to taste her honey and really make love to her. He wanted to curl up around her and fall asleep with her in his arms.

For a moment, Lacey looked as if she wanted him to do all that. For a moment, she looked as if she wanted to be loved, worshipped.

But then the moment passed. Her easy confidence returned, and with it, so Gold’s waned, because as much as she deserved more than what they had done, he also knew she deserved more than him, a bitter divorcé old enough to be her father. He realised his fly was still hanging open and he quickly tucked himself back in his boxers and zipped up.

“So long, Professor.”

“So long, Lacey.”

She walked off out of the darkness of the alley and onto the street beyond, and she didn’t look back.

Gold stayed staring after her for a long time, wanting to call her back but not having the courage to take that leap.

It was only after he had gone into his back pocket for his room key that he found her g-string, and he wished he had gone after her.


End file.
